Highway guard



1'. R. WEBER HIGHWAY GUARU- Filed May 4, 1939 /NVENTo/e I WreodoreR14/@3er d 5% M TORNEY LLI l' Patented Oct. 8, 1940 UNITED STATESHIGHWAY GUARD Theodore R. Weber,

Latrobe, Pa., assignor to American Locomotive Company, New York, N. Y.,a corporation of New York Application May 4, 1939, Serial N o. 271,666

7 Claims.

This invention relates to flexible cable highway guards, and moreparticularly to standards for supporting the cables thereof.

An object of the invention is to provide animproved highway guardstandard employing coil springs for absorbing the forces transmitted tothe standard.

A further object is to provide such a standard in which the coil springsare conical, affording 10 for each spring, a large base area, providinggreater stability and preventing unseating of the spring duringcollision of a motor vehicle with the guard.

A further object is to provide a standard employing conical springs andutilizing the spring characteristics that the large coils compress underordinary collision forces and the small coils compress under forces oflarge magnitude, thereby providing a highway guard capable of properlyuhioning collision forces of various magni- A further object is toemploy a spring, where desired, which will take a permanent set underexcessive impacts, preventing recovery of the spring and thereforeabsorbing a large part of the force of the impact through plastictorsional deformation.

Other and further objects of and advantages achieved by the presentinvention will be apparent from the following description of an approvedembodiment thereof.

Referring to the drawing forming a part of this application, Figure 1-is a side elevation of a portion of a highway guard, showing onestandard completely assembled as when in use, the highway guard postsand cables being indicated fragmentally in dot and dash lines; Fig. 2 isa front view of the structure shown in Fig. 1; and Fig. 3 is a sectionon the line III-III of Fig. 1,

4o parts being shown in full.

A highway guard is a safety fence which is placed along a road atdangerous spots to prevent motor vehicles from leaving the road. Itshould be a flexible fence which will minimize 45 the danger to vehiclescolliding therewith and which will have suicient strength to withstandordinary collisions Without injury to the fence itself. Highway guardsformed of spaced exible 50 cables supported by standards of variouskinds are well known, and most of them which are in use today areobjectionable to some extent because of the inability of the standardsto stand up under the forces applied to them by colliding 55 vehicles,or, on the other hand, if strong enough,

because of their rigidity which detracts from their safety value.

'Ihe present invention involves a novel standard employing coil springsfor resisting the aforesaid forces in such a manner as to provide a 5shock-absorbing standard which does not have the aforesaid undesirablecharacteristics.

A highway guard consists of a row of standards connected by cables. Inthe drawing only one standard is shown as all standards of the high- 10way guard are ordinarily similar. The highway guard standard, indicatedby the numeral I, shown in the drawing comprises a post 2, which may bemade of wood, concrete, iron or other suitable material and which may beof various 15 l shapes, but preferably, as shown in the drawing, has aflat vertical front face 3 or at least fiat vertical portions which willprovide spring seats. The post, when in use, has a portion imbedded inthe ground and a portion extendng upward for supporting the cables. Theposts have orifices-4 for receiving attaching means later to be morefully described.

I n Figs. 1 and 2 a standard for supporting three cables is shown, andthe invention is described 25 in connection with such a standard, b-utit will be understood that the standard may support only one cable, ormore cables, as is desired. The cables, indicated by the letter a,engage a plate 5, Which is of elongated cup or trough shape, 0 theelongation extending in a vertical direction. The plate comprises anouter wall 6 having a flat outer face turned outward away from the post,and side walls or flanges l extending toward the face 3 at an inclinedangle thereto, similar 35 to the angle of conical springs 8 disposedbetween the plate 5 and the post 2.

A conical spring 8 is disposed between the face 3 and the plate 5 ateach end of the plate. These springs may be of a conventional type whichwill completely recover under each defiec- 40 tion regardless of theforce which compresses them, or they may be novel springs which willincrease the advantages of the highway guard. That is to say, theconical springs may be springs which will deflect and recover in theordinary manner under ordinary impacts, but which will, when the highwayguard receives a heavy impact, take a permanent set. Thus, if a vehiclecollides with the highway guard with a force which would ordinarily bedangerous to the human occupants in the vehicle, the spring Will becompressed thereunder beyond the limit of its iiexibility and there willbe a plastic torsional deformationl of the spring which will prevent itscomplete recovery from the deflection. This deformation absorbs a largepart of the force of the impact and offers a constant resistance to theimpact, dissipating the force, preventing a corresponding `force beingapplied to the vehicle by the spring, and cushioning the force finallyapplied to the post. This feature of the invention is not conned toconical springs but in fact may be employed in any suitable type fspring and in other types of guard rails.

The larger base of each spring, whether of the conventional or noveltype of conical formation, seats upon the face 3 and the smaller outerend of each spring seats upon the inner face of the wall 6 between theside walls The side walls I stiifen and strengthen the plate and serveas retaining walls to keep the spring from moving in a directiontheretoward. The plate serves to tie the two springs together. The coilsof each spring are large enough relative to the size of the bar fromwhich they are made to provide a conical opening through the center ofthe spring so that means later to' be described can extend through thespring.

The plate 5, at its portions adjacent the outer ends of the springs anddisposed over the openings therein, contains slots 9. An open link l0extends through each slot Q, providing parts projecting from each sideof the wall G. The outer end portion of each link forms a short hook IIand the inner end portion forms a long hook I2. Each of the hooks II andI2 have a free leg together forming the side of the link which is open,and the adjacent ends of the legs are disposed between the wall l andthe post 2 and are separated by a space I3. When the links lil areassembled with the cables a, which is preferably accomplished by passingthe cable a through the space I3, the cables are moved into the hooksII, which support them, when the standard is completely assembled, inspaced relation to the post 2 and in engagement with the flat face ofthe plate 5, the links I0 extending inward part way through the centerof the spring.

An attaching means, which in the present instance is a bolt I4 having ahook I5 at one end, extends at its hooked end into the conical openingofeach spring 8 from the inner end thereof, each hook I5 gripping theadjacent hook I2, forming a flexible connection consisting of a link I0and a bolt I. The other end of each bolt Ill passes through the adjacentorifice and is secured to the post by a nut I6 and washer I'I. The endof the'leg I8 of each hook I5 abuts against the face 3, thereby, withthe adjacent nut i6, preventing movement of its bolt I4 in the post 2.

The springs 8 are compressed, by the tightening of the nut Iii, to apredetermined extent according to the minimum force which the designerof the highway guard wishes to cushion. The compression of the springsis also suicient to force the plate 5 away from the post under ordinaryvconditions so that the highway guard presents a normally rigid fencewhich only gives under predetermined collision forces.

The center cable a is secured to the plate 5 .by a yoke I9 which hasathreaded leg 20. Holes 2l are formed in the central portion of the plate5 and the legs of the yoke I9 extend through these holes. The holes 2lmay be replaced by slots, if desired, and likewise each slot 9 may bereplaced by a pair of holes. The yoke is secured to the plate by a nut22 threaded on the leg 20. The cables hold the plate .5 in its normalposition,

thereby serving to hold all the members of the highway guard together.As shown in Fig. l, the free leg of the hook I2 is bent inward towardthe opposite side of the link iii suliciently to prevent the link Iiifrom slipping off the bolt Ill when the 5 link moves toward the postduring movement of the cables and plate 5 toward the post.

The cables a stand out from the plate 5 and only the relatively smalldiameter ofthe hook I I and yoke I9 extends over the cable. Thus the 10cables are practically unobstructed to substantially provide acontinuous sliding surface for a colliding vehicle which will tend todeflect the force with which the vehicle hits the highway guard.

As before mentioned, it may be desired that the standard support onlyone cable, and in that event the plate 5 may be supported by twosprings, as shown, or, if desired, only one spring need be employed. Inthe latter case the plate 5 will be circular or square instead ofelongated as sho-wn, and in Vother details the construction would besimilar to the construction already de scribed. If two cables areemployed, the middle cable and yoke alone would be eliminated.` Moresprings, with their attaching means, and more yokes may be added if itis desired to employ additional cables. Cylindrical helical springs mayalso be employed instead of conical springs, where the additionaldesirable features of the conical springs are not required.

The operation of the highway guard, when a motor vehicle collides withit, is as follows: 1f the force is fairly light, the fiexibility of thecables alone may-stop the vehicle safely, or, if such a force is applieddirectly to the plate 5, 35. either one or both springs will becompressed to some extent and the force cushioned. Under forces which donot need to be cushioned, the normal compression of the springs allowsthe highway guard to stand up against the forces as 4|) a normally rigidfence. If the center cable alone is hit, both springs resist the force,and if either of the outermost cables is hit alone, one spring mainlywill resist the force, affording approximately of the total resistanceavailable. 45

If the collision is severe and a force of large magnitude is applied tothe cables, the cables will themselves cushion the force to a certainextent. This is assisted by the `sidewise movement ol' the plate 5 dueto the ilexi-bility of the springs and 50 the link connections. Althoughunder very severe impacts the cables `can move in the hooks `II andyokes I9 of the various standards against the frictional resistance oftheir engagement thereby. Furthermore they are usually twisted cables.of many strands, flexible longitudinallyY to a certain extent, and willyield under severe collision forces. The excess force will betransmitted to the adjacent standards and also to successive standardsdependent upon the magnitude of the force, for in such instances thecables act to distribute the force of the collision over a number ofstandards.

Any suflicient force applied to a plate 5, whether it is transmittedfrom a cable or whether the Q5 plate 5 is collided with directly, willmove the plate 5 toward the post 2 against the resistance of thesprings, and the shock of the force will be broken and partly dissipatedbefore it is transmitted to the post 2. Thus when the highway guardsto-ps the vehicle, considerable of the collision force will have beencushioned. Therefore little damage will ordinarily result to the vehicleor to the highway guard.

Where the deformable springs are employed and where the impact asaforesaid, is a severe one which would be dangerous to human life, thesprings will be compressed until the limit of their iiexibility isreached, which is before the solid height of the spring is reached, andduring further compression the springs will take a permanent set, asaforesaid, affording additional cushioning of the force by the plastictorsional deformation of the spring. Of course, springs which arepermanently set by severe collisions must be replaced, but thisreplacement is relatively inconsequential as compared to theY protectionafforded, for the force that is used up in setting the spring wouldotherwise be received by the vehicle and the occupants thereof. A simpledeformable spring which is well adapted for the above described use in ahighway guard, is a spring which has been tempered but has not been setafter being tempered. It is therefore ready to be set by the first forcewhich compresses it beyond a predetermined extent.

Where conical springs are employed, the spring will maintain its seatupon the post due to the large base area of the spring even when theforce is applied against the side of the plate 5, and will thereforeremain in an operative shock-cushioning position until the collidingvehicle is stopped. A force of sufficient magnitude to move one of theplates toward the adjacent face 3 will cause the large coils of theconical springs to compress first and if the force is not of a largemagnitude, these coils alone may act to cushion the force, but where theforce is severe, the small stiffer coils of the conical springs willalso be compressed, resisting the added force.

Thus a highway guard is provided which will act to cushion light forcesand to cushion heavy forces, which is an improved feature absent inhighway guards now commonly employed.

While there has been hereinbefore described an approved embodiment ofthis invention, it will be understood that many and various changes andmodifications in form, arrangement of parts and details of constructionthereof may be made without departing from the spirit of the inventionand that all such changes and modifications as fall within the scope ofthe appended claims are contemplated as a part of this invention.

The invention claimed and desired to be secured by Letters Patent is:

1. A highway guard standard for supporting a highway guard cablecomprising a post having a face for facing the highway; a helical springseated on said face for flexing, extending outward therefrom; a plateseated on the outer end of said helical spring in opposed spacedrelation with said face, said plate having an outer face adapted toengage said cable; and a link connecting means for seeming said cable tosaid plate, said means extending through said plate and said spring andsecured in said post, securing said plate, spring and post together,thereby supporting said cable by said standard, whereby forces appliedto said cable or plate will be resisted by said spring and said springwill yield under forces beyond a predetermined magnitude to cushion suchforces.

2. A highway guard standard for supporting a h ighway guard cablecomprising a post having a face for facing the highway; a helical springseated on said face for flexing, extending outward therefrom; a plateseated on the outer end of said helical spring in opposed'spacedrelation with said face, said plate having an outer face adapted toengage said cable; and link connecting means comprising a link extendingthrough said plate adapted to engage said cable and to secure said cableto said plate, said means passing through said spring with said linkpassing only partly through said spring to provide a flexible connectionwithin said spring, said means being secured to said post, therebysecuring said cable, plate and spring to said post, said flexibleconnection permitting said cab-le, plate and link to move toward saidpost when forces beyond a predetermined magnitude are applied lto saidcable or plate, whereby said forces will be yieldingly resisted by saidspring.

3. A highway guard standard for supporting a highway guard cablecomprising a post having'a face for. facing the highway; a helicalspring seated on said face for flexing, extending outward therefrom; aplate seated on the 'outer end of said helical spring in opposed spacedrelation with said face, said plate having an outer face adapted toengage said cable; and link connecting means comprising an open 'linkextending through said plate adapted to receive said cable through theopening in said link and to secure said cable to said plate, said meanspassing through said spring with said link passing only partly throughsaid spring to provide a flexible lconnection within said spring, saidmeans being secured to said post, thereby securing said cable, plate andspring to said post, said flexible connection permitting said cable,plate and link to move toward said post when forces beyond apredetermined magnitude are applied to said cable or plate, whereby saidforces will be yieldingly resisted by said spring.

4. A highway guard standard for supporting a highway guard cablecomprising a post having a face for facing the highway; seated on saidface for exing, extending outward therefrom; a plate seated on the outerend of said helical spring in opposed spaced relation with said face,said plate having an outer face adapted to engage said cable; and linkconnecting means comprising a link extending through said plate adaptedto engage said cable and to secure said cable to said plate, a bolthaving a loop connected to said link; a leg of said loop abutting saidpost face, said bolt passing through said post, and a nut securing saidbolt to said post, said connecting means passing through; said springwith saidlink passing only partly through said spring to provide aflexible connection within said spring, said connecting means securingsaid cable, plate and spring to said post, said flexible connectionpermitting said cable, plate and lnk to move toward said post when saidforces beyond a predetermined magnitude are applied to said cable orplate, whereby said forces will be yieldingly resisted by said spring.

5. A highway guard standard for supporting highway guard cablescomprising a post having a face for facing the highway; a pair ofvertically-spaced helical springs seated on said face for iiexing,extending outward therefrom; a plate spanning said springs, seated onthe outer ends thereof in opposed spaced relation with said face, andhaving peripheral flanges directed toward said face, said plate havingan outer face adapted to engage said cables in vertical spaced relation;and means for securing said cables, plate and springs to said postwhereby forces applied to said cables or plate will be resisted by saidsprings and said springs will yield under forces beyond a predeterminedmagnitude to cushion such forces.

a helical spring n 6. A highway guard standard for supporting a highwayguard cable comprising a post having a face for facing the highway; atempered helical compression spring having its inner end seated on saidface for flexing and extending outward therefrom; means supported bysaid spring at its outer end for supporting said cable in opposed spacedrelation with said face; and a link connecting means for securing saidcable to said cable-supporting means, said connecting means extendingthrough said spring and secured to said post, thereby securing saidcablesupporting means, spring and post together for supporting saidcable by said standard whereby forces applied to said cable or saidcable-supporting means will-tbe resisted by said spring and said springwill yield to cushion said forces.

7. A highway guard standard for supporting highway guard cablescomprising a post having 20' a face for facing the highway; a pair ofvertically-spaced helical compression springs having their inner endsseated on said face for flexing and extending outward therefrom; a platespanning the space between said springsand seated on the outer endsthereof in opposed spaced relation with said face, tying said springstogether for unitary action of said springs and plate, said plate havingan outer face adapted to engage said cables one opposite each saidspring; and link connecting means at each spring for securing saidcables to said plate, each said means extending through said plate andthrough said spring adjacent thereto a-nd secured in said post, therebysecuring said plate, springs and post together for supporting saidcables by said standard, whereby forces applied to said cables or platewill be resisted by said springs and said springs will yield underforces beyond a predetermined magnitude to cushion such forces.

THEODORE R. WEBER.

